In an interview yesterday, I was asked how I would go about valuing Tesla...
What would be the most appropriate way to answer this question? And what are some of the most important things you would need to consider.
Would you use a DCF with a long projection period so that you capture the years in which Model 3 production is at full-steam?
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I would value Tesla at 0 and say that there is no model in the world that could accurately predict the proper value for the company. Here's why - the equity value reflects the insanity that is the cult of Elon Musk. There is no amount of rationalization for why the equity value is so high despite the fact that Tesla is an automotive company being valued like a Tech company.
That said, I would use a DCF approach and supplement that with comps. For the DCF, I would need to consider all of the production data from Tesla across all car lines to account for the probability of meeting production deadlines especially when it comes to getting the Model 3 out to market. In the same vein, I would want to consider the deposit refund rate for all classes of cars to account for the reduction in deferred revenue that would happen. I would need to know the terms and conditions of any and every tax credit that Tesla uses to incentive their cars in order to accurately reflect the top line revenue and develop an assumption for how timing and loss of rebates would impact sales. Given the space they are in (renewable energy), I would also need to know what the projections for raw materials costs are for the essential parts they make in house at their Gigafactories (ex. are the 21700s they make INR, IMR, IFR, ICR, NCA, or NCO, because the required materials that go into them can greatly drive OpEx, even if producing them in bulk. INR, for example, requires Lithium, Nickle and Manganese, while something like an ICR uses Cobalt in production which may drive the prices higher). Given the price sensitivity for parts used to build electric vehicles, I can see this being a surprisingly underutilized driver of costs.
I would still use a 5-7 year projection window, as I think you'll hit capacity during that time for the Model 3, but again, much of it is driven by how much Tesla can actually get off the ground running. I mentioned before about putting a comps table together too, to show comparison against other Auto companies because Tesla is a car company, and any other industry you want to compare it against.
Honestly, I think that the Hard Assets should be worth at least the value of the debt, even considering depreciation, as they can be sold off for producing other things fairly quickly. Mind you, the NUMMI factory that Tesla uses went unused for years before Tesla bought it. So I honestly believe that the hard assets can be recouped, even in today's market for more than expected. The factories can be repurposed for other cars and the battery plant, well, can produce tons of non-21700 batteries quickly too.
So the recoup on them should be nice, but then again, based on P/BV, it's clear that the debt is greater than the Book Value. The Book Value on the assets somewhere around 3.8/3.9 Bln. Figure with a P/BV of 13.17 and a Market Price of 301.66/Share, that's 22.95/Share in Book Value. At ~170MM outstanding, that's the 3.8/3.9 valuation right there.
Oh, I agree that the majority of the valuation is all Musk. This is why I hate tech companies that rely on the cult of personality and can't back it up. As much as management is important, the question is "Can a company survive if the visionary is no longer there?" I mean, Apple is a great case study in this - as Jobs had two stints with the company, nearly driving it into the ground the first time and reinventing it the second time. Apple survived both experiences without its visionary leader. Bezos... he worked out well leading Amazon, but everyone forgets that Amazon was one of the few online retailers that survived the Tech Crash. That's a huge point to remember, so when you're the last one standing early on, it's easier to overcome when your competition is wiped out.
Then again, I think the $60Bln isn't a reflection of the past, but a reflection of the fact that there is this expectation that Venture-Backed Unicorns, or people who are linked to Venture-Backed Unicorns, can deliver the magic. So Musk's ties to Paypal, his various investments in companies that were bought out, etc., make him the perfect image of "successful visionary". People buy the image, not the expectation of what worked last cycle.